The announced Halong DragonMint Bitcoin Miner is set to rock the Bitcoin mining scene with its high spec and price, putting it in direct competition with the market leaders Bitmain with their Antminer hardware.

The Halong Mining announcement today focused on their DragonMint miner series, with their flagship model set to be the DragonMint 16T. The unit’s ambitious price and specs should see them taking on the Bitmain Tech mining giants.

The DragonMint 16T is rated at 16TH (Terahashes) and looks to be priced at $1,350, giving it the specs and price to aggressively compete with Bitmain’s Antimer S9 which, in comparison, only offers 14TH’s and currently retails at $3,000 – over twice the price of the new DragonMint. The news has been greeted with cautious excitement that the mining world could finally see an end to what has been Bitmain’s mining monopoly.

The DragonMint 16T miner is the world’s most efficient Bitcoin miner, running faster and cooler than any competing miners. It’s the culmination of over 12 months research and development which has resulted in major advancements in mining technology including a brand new generation of ASIC mining chips. The DM8575 ASIC runs at a staggering 85GH per chip with power efficiency of around 0.075J/GH.

The Online Tease and Announcement

A blue dash of lightning tears apart the silent night of the Middle Kingdom, the world of the cartel will soon be devoured by roaring fire erupting from within the Earth. pic.twitter.com/5pc2qbaJ1j

The announcement was preceded by a brief online tease (see above) of an image of a Bitcoin fireball lying beneath the cool ice with the final reveal coming barely 20 minutes later. The announcement addresses the key issues for Bitcoin mining – power and cooling.

Bitcoin was initially mined on GPUs and FPGA before moving into the world of specialist ASIC chips as used in the DragonMint 16T. The dominance of Bitmain in the Bitcoin hardware mining sector has gone fairly unchallenged, leading to what has become a more centralized operation, with mining or hash power being held in increasingly smaller hands.

Bitcoin’s decentralized dream is challenged by forces monopolizing what is essentially the means of Bitcoin production, but Halong’s affordable model, with its top-level specs, have at least got their targets set on putting Bitcoin’s mining capability back into a wider set of hands.

See a demo of the DragonMint 16T in action below:

Manufacturing these units at scale, to cost and to schedule could prove to be quite a herculean challenge for Halong. There is currently no word on when the units will be ready to ship

Are you mining or looking at mining Bitcoin, this looks like a possibly cheaper entry. Can Halong deliver? Let us know what you think in the comments below.